Malenia's difficulty is overhyped

[Not_L_Username]

I really don't understand how people found her that difficult. I think I got to her phase 2 about 4 times and beat her on the 4th. She can literally be **staggered** and it's super easy to rack up massive damage on her.

Her phase 2 is nothing compared to her phase 1 and can be breezed through due to massive openings and 0 poise. I beat her without using a meta build and without using any summons and still don't think she comes close to Midir, Gael or nameless on a first time playthrough.

For context I had her 1 shot within 50 minutes on phase 2 but got an unlucky waterfowl. Beat her in sub 2 hours with no cheese which is very disappointing considering bots called her "the hardest boss in gaming". Am I just too good or something?

[SnakeshyperTTV/Kick]

You are just to good.

[Mr_Blank]

He’s back!

[Skkooomer Lord]

Playing for the first time and finding the game way easier than most peoples experiences too.

[Bobo]

Originally posted by MrFantasticCraft:

got an unlucky waterfowl

Is that even a thing? Makes me wonder if you just got a lucky fight without much waterfowling so now you think it's easier than it typically is.

Nameless took me about 10 attempts, Midir took several, and Gael took two on my first DS3 playthrough.

I can't properly compare Malenia to DS3 bosses because I ended up cheesing her with a Mimic the first few times I beat her (and still died multiple times). She's definitely the hardest if you're not doing something broken (Rivers, Blasphemous) or using summons, but Elden Ring has so much cheese to make her easier. Most recently, it took me more than a dozen attempts to beat her solo with an overpowered (due to mods) parry+crit build because I'm bad at parrying her phase 2.

I really like the Gael fight, but Malenia is harder for sure unless you're abusing OP ER stuff that doesn't exist in DS3.

[Señor Brown]

Originally posted by MrFantasticCraft:

I really don't understand how people found her that difficult. I think I got to her phase 2 about 4 times and beat her on the 4th. She can literally be **staggered** and it's super easy to rack up massive damage on her.

Her phase 2 is nothing compared to her phase 1 and can be breezed through due to massive openings and 0 poise. I beat her without using a meta build and without using any summons and still don't think she comes close to Midir, Gael or nameless on a first time playthrough.

For context I had her 1 shot within 50 minutes on phase 2 but got an unlucky waterfowl. Beat her in sub 2 hours with no cheese which is very disappointing considering bots called her "the hardest boss in gaming". Am I just too good or something?

What was your build?

[Not_L_Username]

Originally posted by Bobo:

Originally posted by MrFantasticCraft:

got an unlucky waterfowl

Is that even a thing? Makes me wonder if you just got a lucky fight without much waterfowling so now you think it's easier than it typically is.

Nameless took me about 10 attempts, Midir took several, and Gael took two on my first DS3 playthrough.

I can't properly compare Malenia to DS3 bosses because I ended up cheesing her with a Mimic the first few times I beat her (and still died multiple times). She's definitely the hardest if you're not doing something broken (Rivers, Blasphemous) or using summons, but Elden Ring has so much cheese to make her easier. Most recently, it took me more than a dozen attempts to beat her solo with an overpowered (due to mods) parry+crit build because I'm bad at parrying her phase 2.

I really like the Gael fight, but Malenia is harder for sure unless you're abusing OP ER stuff that doesn't exist in DS3.

I've killed Gael about 9 times and even at SL1 but his cape and crossbow move's still destroy me every time.

As for the unlucky waterfowl she was 1 hp and hit a waterfowl so after I had dodged it she regened HP and I died. I didn't use summons, and just used a Greatsword without any bloodhound step or bleed gem infusion either.

[Not_L_Username]

Originally posted by DR. MAXWELL. NOX:

you are a legend brother! im playing the game for the very first time, and i am embarrassed.....to say i am hard stuck on her. would you be willing to help me defeat her? please?

I would but I've sorta sworn to not play the game again as it made me miserable. I'm sure you can find someone on the discord or forums though, I believe in you fr. Sorry.

[Koala 4peace]

Fascinating.

[Not_L_Username]

Originally posted by Señor Brown:

Originally posted by MrFantasticCraft:

I really don't understand how people found her that difficult. I think I got to her phase 2 about 4 times and beat her on the 4th. She can literally be **staggered** and it's super easy to rack up massive damage on her.

Her phase 2 is nothing compared to her phase 1 and can be breezed through due to massive openings and 0 poise. I beat her without using a meta build and without using any summons and still don't think she comes close to Midir, Gael or nameless on a first time playthrough.

For context I had her 1 shot within 50 minutes on phase 2 but got an unlucky waterfowl. Beat her in sub 2 hours with no cheese which is very disappointing considering bots called her "the hardest boss in gaming". Am I just too good or something?

What was your build?

Greatsword. Think it might've had an infusion that improved the strength scaling but that's about it.

[Krazy Wallet]

Depends on your build, experience, and playstyle. I faced her on my first build that had around 40 vigor. Her waterfowl deleted me every time - I was also using two colossal swords before they buffed the recovery speed of these weapons. It took me about 3 hours to beat her as a close waterfowl = death for me. On my second playthrough, I had 60 vigor and could survive a flurry, took me about 5 attempts.

I can't speak for everyone else, but I vastly underestimated the value of vigor and defense talismans at launch. I did really nice damage, but pretty much every end-game boss could one shot me or combo me to death. From the forum posts at that time, I think a lot of people failed the vigor check on Malenia's waterfowl and flower dance making her feel impossible.

[MundM]

I call liar.
You can be very good at the game and kill her, but, dude, it took you almost 2 hours but you still say she's not hard? 4 attempts in almost 2 hours? I call bs! There's no way you fought her almost 30 minutes each times, that's just an absurd thing to say. You might want to overthing the definition of a challenge.
You only get bragging rights if you can provide proof.

[Not_L_Username]

Originally posted by MundM:

I call liar.
You can be very good at the game and kill her, but, dude, it took you almost 2 hours but you still say she's not hard? 4 attempts in almost 2 hours? I call bs! There's no way you fought her almost 30 minutes each times, that's just an absurd thing to say. You might want to overthing the definition of a challenge.
You only get bragging rights if you can provide proof.

you misunderstood, I killed her on the 4th time I got her to her second phase. So I only got to her 2nd phase 4 times, had her one tap on one attempt and killed her on the 4th attempt.

[Not_L_Username]

Originally posted by Krazy Wallet:

Depends on your build, experience, and playstyle. I faced her on my first build that had around 40 vigor. Her waterfowl deleted me every time - I was also using two colossal swords before they buffed the recovery speed of these weapons. It took me about 3 hours to beat her as a close waterfowl = death for me. On my second playthrough, I had 60 vigor and could survive a flurry, took me about 5 attempts.

I can't speak for everyone else, but I vastly underestimated the value of vigor and defense talismans at launch. I did really nice damage, but pretty much every end-game boss could one shot me or combo me to death. From the forum posts at that time, I think a lot of people failed the vigor check on Malenia's waterfowl and flower dance making her feel impossible.

Yeah every souls game before that had a much lower soft cap for vigor (except DS2). And as for defense talismans

I was quite aware of their existence due to often using ring of steel protection / lloyd's shield ring. I agree with you that people definitely underestimate vigor, but that's also partly due to fromsoft not really encouraging it in older games. I also didn't put a single point into magic so I had alot more souls to go towards vigor.

[LT2483]

Her difficulty fluctuates wildly depending on your build. I beat her 4th try (which was also the 1st try I hit 2nd phase, that was an unpleasant surprise), solo only, no spoilers beyond "she is super hard"... and I've never played another souls game. Didn't change my build or anything, I just took her down. And yet, when doing a co-op run with a friend some time after, we struggled HARD until one of us modified our build a bit.

So certain builds maker her actually quite easy, and other make her the "hardest boss in gaming". Of course builds designed for her melt her, but also plenty are just coincidentally really effective.

But also, only "sub 2 hours"? That's quite the time to spend on a boss to then call it easy. Only boss that took me that long was the final one, and over 90% of that fight was running after it (no, not an exaggeration). Pretty sure it bugged with the sheer amount of fleeing it did, since it didn't do nearly as much when I was doing the co-op run.

[Not_L_Username]

Originally posted by LT2483:

Her difficulty fluctuates wildly depending on your build. I beat her 4th try (which was also the 1st try I hit 2nd phase, that was an unpleasant surprise), solo only, no spoilers beyond "she is super hard"... and I've never played another souls game. Didn't change my build or anything, I just took her down. And yet, when doing a co-op run with a friend some time after, we struggled HARD until one of us modified our build a bit.

So certain builds maker her actually quite easy, and other make her the "hardest boss in gaming". Of course builds designed for her melt her, but also plenty are just coincidentally really effective.

But also, only "sub 2 hours"? That's quite the time to spend on a boss to then call it easy. Only boss that took me that long was the final one, and over 90% of that fight was running after it (no, not an exaggeration). Pretty sure it bugged with the sheer amount of fleeing it did, since it didn't do nearly as much when I was doing the co-op run.

I'm quite happy with sub two hours considering I had her 1 shot within 45-50 mins but got unlucky. I sorta lost motivation from that point to kill her so I was quite low effort past that point. Definitely easy imo compared to really any DS3 DLC boss (except for the trash ones). First time Friede, Midir and Gael were a level of difficulty that ER wishes it could have.

I'm still annoyed about that 1hp malenia moment though lol